Peaceful parenting

Over the past few years we've gone from having very limited cell phone use,  internet access and tv to having all of it on all day long.    How short have I become with my children and husband, no one has a nice word to say anymore, chores around the house skipped or done too quickly, papers piled up in corners, friends ignored. Time slips away when staring at the screen.  I've not read a single book cover to cover in two years! I'm an avid reader, I LOVE books. though this last part may have something to do with a certain two year old .. :) who won't let me sit down for one minute.

Two Major things I'm doing to get back on track and change the way I am reacting to the antics of my adorable wild and crazy  children and give my husband his wife back.

Media break;   I'm not the only one who has let social media rule the house as I have several friends giving this a go too.  Its been in the back of my mind all year,  limit the screen time - I decided to deactivate facebook and slim down on the emails I receive. The tv and video games are being limited to nap times and rainy days.

yelling, I made a pact with my kids this week not to yell. To be intentional about what comes out of my mouth, I'd already had this verse printed out and then a friend posted it on her facebook wall along with a comment that we need to be more mindful about what we say and how we say it, needless to say it reinforced that we need a change.       Taking one day at a time,  I'll wait until I'm done fuming over whatever it is they have done (like leave the door wide open so that the dogs run out of the house, and I have to chase them through the corn fields into the closest neighbors yard and pray pray pray that none of the chickens become happy play things. and then talk to my children instead of being obnoxiously loud.  I have a sticker chart, suggested in the book  Peaceful Parent, Happy Kids and the kids get to give me a sticker at the end of each day if I succeed in no yelling.  My 10 year old thinks its lame, my 8 year old thinks its AWESOME and gave me a huge hug and said I'm the best mama in the whole wide world,  my 2 year old just wants to eat the stickers.

 photo from this site

Sum it up saturday

i'm joining jenny on peasandcarrots with Sum it up Saturday - a recap of our homeschooling week - 

I skipped last week as we had been sick the previous week and didn't do much of anything but lay around the house. 

This week we played catch up,  it seems like we are doing that A lot right now, there's always something going on.  

we caught up on piano lessons,  did a year end math review and worked on another week of MFW

after a long debate and purchasing next years curriculum, We've made the decision to take two years to complete countries and cultures.  I'm ok with us taking our time with each week instead of feeling rushed to get the lessons in and its taken a huge stress off, so we spent another week on south america. 

we are still reading Nate saint, our planner calls for a chapter a day, we are reading several chapters a week instead. ( our rabbit has been joining us for reading sessions)  we are all enjoying this book about a mission pilot,  had a discussion about the dangers of flying in the amazon rain forest. we decided to make paper airplanes again and then flew them outside. 

We took a few field trips to several different parks and enjoyed the weather since it was super nice out. 

Sum it up Saturday

Every Sunday night I'm at the kitchen table until midnight, or later (usually later)  planning the week, copying the pages from our teachers manuel, writing down lessons, gathering supplies and making various todo lists. I got distracted this past Sunday night - my 7 yo stepped on a picture frame in his room. Its a picture of a treasure map, he had taken it down to look at it, placed it on the step stool and then stood on the step stool so he could look at his leopard geckos   He told me that he was thankful he had socks on and that he jumped down as soon as he realized what he had done. I'm thankful that all the glass stayed IN the frame and that he wasn't hurt. what came of this - well im hoping he wont take the pictures off the walls from now on, or atleast wont step on them.  

Monday morning rolls around, and no lessons planned. Its beautiful outside so we spend most of the week out. Apart from math and spanish our lessons were on the go as I never did get to sit down and open the planner up. Mon and tues were spent cleaning up around the yard. Wednesday we took a trip to the zoo and the family vision library in st louis and Thursday we hung out for an hour with our homeschool group for field day, then off to see a musical, Joseph and the Technicolor coat st cedarhurst in mt vernon. We all enjoyed watching the play but were sad that we'd left field day early. I'm currently a stay at home mom, husband and I met 17 years ago and have been married for 11 yrs. We are a family of 6, kit is 10, eon is 7, si is 2 and jbug is 6 months. Our two oldest are Homeschooled using my fathers world countries and cultures, we also add in lapbooking and unit studies. We officially school 4 days a week. Just not always the same four days. Please join us for sum it up Saturdays by linking your blog post in the comments. Cant wait to read about your homeschooling week. t 


Im blogging along with jenny at Peas n Carrots. Jenny shares how her homeschooling week has gone with sum it up Saturdays.